The Guardian reports on a “Community PC” – which Intel are developing. Rather than donating old PCs to the majority world, they are developing PCs that are robust enough to cope with high humidity, lots of bugs (the multi -legged sort) – as well as lots of different users.
From a maintenance point of view, it’s designed to have a one button restore – should the multiple users accidentally install a virus. There are also hardware adapations to cope with highly variable electricty supplies.
Intel aren’t the only people to be looking at this market though, the article also mentions AMD’s Personal Communicator, and I’ve commented on MITs initiative for low cost laptops
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It seems that MIT’s offering is getting closer.
http://www.itworld.com/Comp/1290/050928mitlaptop/
The MIT Media Laboratory expects to launch a prototype of its US$100 laptop in November, according to Nicholas Negroponte, the lab’s chairman and co-founder. The facility has been working with industry partners to develop a notebook computer for use by children in primary and secondary education around the world, particularly in developing countries. The laptops should start appearing in volume in late 2006.
And, here’s the MIT page: http://laptop.media.mit.edu/